My Dumb Country

First off, let me say this: I love Bill Hicks. He's an excellent comedian, and he's got really intelligent thinking to back himself up with. In one of his stand-up acts, he reenacts a scene from an old movie where an outlaw throws a pistol at the feet of a hapless shepherd.

Outlaw: "Pick it up"
Shepherd: "I can't, mister, you'll shoot me."
Outlaw: "Pick up the gun."
Shepherd: "Look mister, I don't want no trouble. I'm just going to town, going to the store to get some gingham for my wife. I don't even know what gingham is but she goes through about 10 rolls a week of that stuff."
Outlaw: "Pick up the gun."
(The shepherd reaches down to pick up the gun) BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
Outlaw: "You all saw him... he had a gun."

It pisses me off to think that the country I live in is exactly like the outlaw in that movie. The U.S. is one of the world's leading arms exporters (Including to, get this, the MIDDLE silly EAST), and yet we also get our troops involved in conflicts in other countries more than anyone else as well. What this amounts to is that we arm countries, then we blow the crap out of them. Wow, what an intelligent policy. Take that, third world.

It's amazing to think that if I ever went off on a war, the guys firing back at me would probably be shooting weapons that said either "Made In USA" or "Made In Germany" (So I can give H&K the props they deserve). Isn't that a bit ludicrous to think that my own country and its allies are responsible for making the weapons that would kill me? It's like my country is saying "Sorry, young men who go to give your lives for everyone's freedom. Our fat silly wallets are more important than your lives! Have fun in the middle east, now!"

Terrorists are so silly deluded. They're just religious people who took everything their religion says literally, and then added some of their own thoughts to it "for flavor." Dammit, the idiocy of people never ceases to amaze me. Yet another problem that has a horribly twisted religion as its source. Remember, it's not murder... it's the will of Allah. That kind of thinking makes me want to scream, break things, and kill cute forest creatures.

Terrorism should be stopped, of course, pretty much everyone agrees with that. The ways the U.S. has gone about trying to achieve this end, however, are pathetically stupid. The only real way to eliminate the terrorist threat is to eliminate the thinking that causes terrorism. Why do these people hate us? They don't have any solid reasons except that it's drilled into their heads from day one. This is the source of the problem, and it's also the only way we're going to stop terrorism. We've been trying to fight a war on terror OUR way. It doesn't work, and it never will.

And in the middle of all of this utter stupidity displayed by our government, we have the general populace of this country, who sit there clueless to anything but the fact that American Gladiators is on the television. There's some voice out there somewhere saying "Go back to bed America. Your government has figured it all out. Go back to bed America. Your government is in control. Go back to bed America, you're free... to do as we tell you. Here, America, don't think for yourself, watch American Gladiators instead. Here, here's American Gladiators. Here's 56 channels of it. Watch these glandular freaks bang their silly skulls together and thank your lucky stars that you live in the land of the free. Just check your brain at the door, free thinking is frowned upon here."

And then, the majority of this country listens to that goddamn voice, blindly supporting the government no matter how horrible the decisions they're making are. Does that disturb anyone else besides me? We're a democracy, ideally a society of intelligent people making intelligent decisions for the common good, yet when the majority of the population is so clueless they can't punch a silly ballot (See Florida 2000 elections), I wonder how the hell we've lasted as long as we have. One of my favorite quotes is "Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch." Sad but true, apparently.

Well first off let me say I like you're rant/discussion starter/whatever you meant it to be, and agreed with it for the most part, however I don't agree with your section on the religous aspect of it. You say:

"Terrorists are so silly deluded. They're just religious people who took everything their religion says literally, and then added some of their own thoughts to it "for flavor." Dammit, the idiocy of people never ceases to amaze me. Yet another problem that has a horribly twisted religion as its source. Remember, it's not murder... it's the will of Allah."

Now I don't know what your religion is, and don't expect you to tell me, but I for one believe that all religions are deluded and are merely a mechanism to deal with the extreme fear all humans have about death. You talk about Islam like it is so different from any other religion throughout history. Didn't the Catholics go on Crusades to root out those who didn't worship their God and Savor Jesus Christ and murder them? Didn't they also have the Inquisition where thousands upon thousands of innocent Spanish civilians were killed because they were suspected of not being Catholic? However when a small radical group of Muslims kill a petty 2,000 Americans (and by all means I mean no disrespect to anyone killed in the 9/11 attacks, I use this wording to convey my point) everyone of this religion is considered the enemy. If you generalize an entire religion by a very small radical group, it would be like saying the KKK exemplifies good Christians and good Americans. So shouldn't America, a nation based on Catholicism, the bloodiest religion by far in the history of man be considered silly deluded and the enemy?

Also, as for your:

"Why do these people hate us? They don't have any solid reasons except that it's drilled into their heads from day one."

Well, didn't you give a very good solid reason in your beginning? You said:

"The U.S. is one of the world's leading arms exporters (Including to, get this, the MIDDLE silly EAST), and yet we also get our troops involved in conflicts in other countries more than anyone else as well. What this amounts to is that we arm countries, then we blow the crap out of them. Wow, what an intelligent policy. Take that, third world."

If I was living in Iraq and saw this corrupt foreign country going on an invasion crazy rampage...I might hate them as well. I might hate the fact that they are the leading consumer in the world and don't stop for a moment to think about the large majority of people in the world living off so much less than what we consider "extremely poor". I might hate the fact that because they are the leading consumer they indirectly promote underage children workers and extremely low paid foreign salaries, so they can get there white t-shirts and bag of doritos for 10 cents cheaper. i I might hate the fact they insist on forcing democracy around the world instead of respecting nations sovereignty. They all seem like pretty good reasons to me.

"Terrorists are so silly deluded.They're just religious people who took everything their religion says literally"
The KKK is a TERRORIST Christian group with a idiosyncratic interpretation of the Bible. I never took the terrorist group to symbolize the whole country, That's why I started off with Terrorists and kept repeating terrorists throughout the whole thing.

"If I was living in Iraq and saw this corrupt foreign country going on an invasion crazy rampage."
I'm not talking about the Iraq as a whole, as you said before, a small terrorist group doesn't represent the whole country. Although those are very good points on why the country as a whole might dislike us, Islamic radicalists have a very different way of seeing things, more in a religious aspect. I don't think the KKK burned black people alive for better wages.

How's America based on Catholicism? I think I missed that part somewhere in my lessons.

All i can say about Bumble's interesting and understandable views on America and Husky's crash course in Religion's misgivings and his empathy for people living in Iraq is simple.

In the minority or majority ( i havent decided yet.) Humans are dumb. Look at their track record and you would want them out of the job (of life) unless they changed things in the short term.
The Governments of any country try to do the best thing for everyone, but in the end their forfilling their greedy desires. This is especially true for America, just look at their track record in foreign policy.
There are alot of Pro's and Con's to any argument, a hot potatoe like America is no different.

Btw, if this reply let you down in the length stakes. Im sorry, im ashamed too but it was effort enough trying to comprehend what was being said and what arguments were being formed. Its a monday after all

"Terrorism should be stopped, of course, pretty much everyone agrees with that. The ways the U.S. has gone about trying to achieve this end, however, are pathetically stupid. The only real way to eliminate the terrorist threat is to eliminate the thinking that causes terrorism. Why do these people hate us? They don't have any solid reasons except that it's drilled into their heads from day one. This is the source of the problem, and it's also the only way we're going to stop terrorism. We've been trying to fight a war on terror OUR way. It doesn't work, and it never will."

Most (if not all) terrorists groups goal is to create chaos, witch proved to be a great sucess seening how the states have declared "war on terrorism". I have read a great book, but i dont think it has an english translation called "hur man botar en fanatiker" (how to cure a fanatic) witch is not realy that much about "curing" a fanatic, more like understanding them.

I can also add that all countries, IT, industrial or developing, is doing some very stupid things, some more thna others. Here in Sweden, for example, the goverment have decided to vote yes on a law called "the FRA-law" witch means that they can listen to private calls and read emails and such without suspiction of crimes, useing the excuse to find terrorists and other criminals. Luckly due to tons of demonstrations and other actions against the desicion they might have a re-vote. I am not trying to in any way to justify the actions of the U.S of A, just saying that it is not the only country filled with jerks.

Alot can be said about these matters. And i might write another post but this will do for now. I am no expert on U.S. politics, but hopefully i got most facts right

"Btw, if this reply let you down in the length stakes. Im sorry, im ashamed too but it was effort enough trying to comprehend what was being said and what arguments were being formed. Its a monday after all"

Your post was not exactly a oneliner saying something like "your op1nionz sUxXorz" ^^ i see nothing to apologise about.

Alright I guess now that i look back on the first part I can see where you're coming from, but the way you used religion in your arguement came off as generalizing terrorism with Islam (which so many people do) by using lines such as "horribly twisted religion as its source" and "Remember, it's not murder... it's the will of Allah". Now I don't know if you meant for "horribly twisted" to mean what I thought: the religion itself is horribly twisted or maybe what you were trying to say: terrorists horribly twist the ideals of Islam. My interpretation of this last night seemed more of an attack directly at the Islam religion more so than on terrorists, but now that I see you probably ment the later of the interpretations I understand what you were really trying to convey.

I still do believe that terrorists would most likely agree with why Middle East countries as whole hate us. They are a product of their environment, and if growing up they hate America for the reasons I listed, they are feuled by this hate to go join a radical terrorist group. Not all terrorists were in fact terrorists from day one which I felt you sort of conveyed in your argument. But part of me as well starts to agree that while there may be some small valid arguments of why terrorists target us, the main reason is like Frankah said; they like chaos. It reminds of me of in Batman (lol good reference I know but hear me out) when Alfred (Batman's wise old mentor) is making an analogy for the Joker and says that not everyone is feuled by any means of self gain, some people want nothing more than to watch the world burn to the ground. I feel this was added not only obviously as an analogy for the Joker but also for terrorism.

That was a miswording using "based on" what I meant was that as a whole we are a Catholic country, and even have "In God We Trust" as the American moto, printed on American currency; not because it is meant to be inclusive to all religions who worship a God but is supposed to be specific to Christian Americans who wanted their God to be recognized.

Just one short note husky, and this might be what you meant but if that is the case then you maybe should refrase it a bit. Terrorists in general dont do it just to make the "world burn down" they want chaos for some other (twisted) reason, each group with a different reason. You probably meant to say that but it can easly be misunderstod. ^^

Terrorists want to terrorize people- It's pretty much chaos in all cases.

True, and i tihnk there is one thing we can all agree on and that is that terrorism is bad and fighting terrorism with more terror is wrong (of someone disagree, then say so) By the way, nice work makeing such a board Lizzy! This should be something everyone SHOULD be at least a little intrested in and a diskusion is always nice to have. ^^

Well I used "there may be some small valid arguments of why terrorists target us" because is your argument not about "My Dumb Country". That dumb country being America. I figured I'd focus my response on your America and not bring other countries affected by terrorism. I am well aware of the fact that we are not the only country being targeted.

Moving on, it seems that both of you agree that we are not combating terrorism correctly. Lissa you said: "This is the source of the problem, and it's also the only way we're going to stop terrorism. We've been trying to fight a war on terror OUR way. It doesn't work, and it never will". Frankah said: "terrorism is bad and fighting terrorism with more terror is wrong". So if the way we are handling terrorism is bad, how then should we combat it? I see only one way to combat terrorism (but probably will be swayed by your upcoming arguements) and that way is to fight fire with fire. The only way to end terrorist organizations is to root them out and destroy them completely like they wish to do to us.

Fight fire with fire only gets a bigger fire-
Why not fight fire with water? Set out the flame ^_^

haha cute, how can i argue with that :p